HELP!! Light setup!!

[dcknipe]

Hello!! I recently bought a lighting kit off of ebay. I know its not awesome but I only got it for 1 shoot I'm doing for my sister in-law. She wants to suprise her husband with some photos. Anyways I have a 10x10 white and black backdrop "which is REALLY thin" and I got 2 White umbrella's with stands and lights 6500k I think. So my question is how should I set these lights up for a inside shots. She wants to do some boudoir photos, so can someone please spill some knowledge on me. Google has failed me!

1: How do I need to have these setup? Shoot thru the white umbrella making it like a softbox? or just turn it around?

2: Her skin color is tan, so do I need reflectors? all these photos will be taken inside my house!

3: Anything else I cant think of or dont know that someone can give me advise on??

[zona5101]

How much light do they put out? This is going to determine how far away you can put the lights at an aperture that gives you decent depth of field. Also are the lights continuos lighting or strobe? This will limit your shutter speed on the high end although I doubt that will be a constraint in your application. In general, you are going to want soft light so you will use the shoot thrus or bounce the light off interior walls. In either case, some of the light output will be sucked up in the process.... which may will limit where you can put the lights.
So lets say the lights are plenty powerful enough. My first thought would be to use the interior walls and point the lights at the ceiling/walls so you get the maximum wrapping light. The light should be fairly even and soft and from there it's just pose and shoot. The wall/ceiling should provide enough shadow that the shot is not completely flat. It it appears too flat then you can move a light to give a bit of shadow. The placement of the light itself is less important, what is more important is the placement of the shadow. Every room will be a bit different but the key is watching how the shadows fall. You generally want them soft, no hard edge, but still noticeable to give your shot dimension.

If you can use the wall/ceiling I think you wont't need a reflector but it never hurts to have one. It would perfect if you find your light to be too even, you can add some more light to one side to create the contrasting shadow.

Practice before you attempt this so you can spend less time monkeying with the lights and more time working on poses and such.